So says the opening line on page two of the new four-month-old independently published comic book.
The comic is a unique world of magic and cultures. It is the story of two different creatures; one of them is the Fenrae (pronounced Fen-ray) who exhibit wolflike qualities but aren’t necessarily wolves, and the Chic’tr (pronounced Chick-tear), a pack of six-legged insect-like creatures who look a lot like ants and have two sharp claws at the front of their mouths that extend outward.
“Ernor” (pronounced Air-Nor) is a story of survival. The publication is a six-issue bimonthly mini-series created by Patrick and Vicky Morgan-Keith, a couple in McKinney, Texas who have been artists all their lives.
“We always wanted to do a comic book,” Patrick said. “Both Vicky and I had been doing some of our own stuff for several years.”
“We eventually found out that both of us had had this similar interest since childhood,” Vicky added. “We both had been drawing since we were kids.”
Vicky, who received her degree in art from Lamar University in Beaumont, Tx., said animation from Disney movies, Don Bluth and such Japanese animation series like “Marine Boy”, inspired her to become an artist.
Patrick’s interest in animation happened when he first saw the cartoon “Speed Racer”.
The first issue of “Ernor” debuted in most comic bookstores across the country in July. The second issue arrived in September and the third is expected to hit stores sometime in November.
The Keiths originally planned on publishing the title as a series of novels.
“We were working on the first book of that and had done twenty-some-odd chapters through the conclusion,” Patrick said. “We only had a few more chapters to go and we thought about the hassle that was involved in sending it to publishers and dealing with someone else looking at our stuff.”
The title is currently distributed by Diamond Comics Distributors, which previews upcoming issues from a number of well-known publishers that include Marvel, DC and Dark Horse as well as a number of titles from independent companies like the Keiths.
“We have total creative control over our title,” Patrick said. “They are our characters. We have the rights to the comic book. Diamond does not have any say on the subject matter.”
Diamond does, however, ask that all publishers list what age group their titles are geared for since some of the stories today fall under adult categories equivalent to R and even NC-17 movies. But “Ernor”, the Keiths say is for most everyone including young kids. It is not geared to just one group of people.
Both share the publishing duties which include the drawing of the characters, typing out the dialogue and storylines and getting the issues scanned into QuarkXPress and Adobe Photoshop. Between the two of them, the couple can only come out with an issue every other month.
“There are only two of us doing the comic,” Patrick said. “It takes Vicky two weeks to a month to pencil 22 pages and then it takes us ten days to a week to do the inking if we can both get involved with that. Putting it on the computer and doing the lettering takes about two days.”
The idea for “Ernor” struck about four years ago after the Keiths played a Dungeons and Dragons type game with a few friends.
“Basically, I used the D & D rules for the game that we played,” Patrick said. “I created the characters and the setting, which is now Ernor, and named mountain ranges and forests for my characters to run around in.”
The rules for Dungeons & Dragons require that the player have a list of abilities for each of the characters he or she creates, Patrick added. “We used the D & D rules as sort of a framework to tell the story so if another person was wanting to attack an opponent or hunt down an animal, they would use the game stats I gave them to see what the outcome would be.”
“You have guidelines for these characters but as far as their personality goes, that is something each player makes up,” he said.
Both Keiths agree that doing the role playing allowed other people to come up with different situations neither might have come up with on their own.
“You get a lot of ideas other than just brainstorming yourself. True, I can have that character run off and do this or I can have them react a certain way. But...if you turn that character over to somebody else, you are going to be surprised by how they react in a certain situation,” Patrick said.
Dungeons and Dragons was not the only basis for the Ernor story.
“I have read about and watched shows and videos on all different kinds of animals on the Discovery Channel but in particular, wolves, and what I wanted to do was come up with an anthropomorphic story that hasn’t been done before,” Patrick said.
“I didn’t want to do that,” Vicki said.
Patrick said the main character and hero in “Ernor”, Whitepaw, is a wolf-like creature but he and the pack are not actual wolves.
“Whitepaw is a character I created a long, long time ago and compared to some early drawings that I have done of him, he has grown up some since then,” Vicky said. “Hask is a character Patrick came up with.”
The six issue series is going to be all about Whitepaw’s pack.
“Their territory has been invaded by these antlike creatures and so Whitepaw kind of goes off on his own to get help and that’s pretty much what the story is about, the adventures that he has along the way and the other creatures of Ernor that he runs into,” Patrick said. “He is pretty much a little puppy when he starts out, so he does not really know about the world around him. He just knows about his pack.”
“Throughout the series, Whitepaw will have to deal with not just his own prejudices that he has been brought up to learn but deal with the prejudices of the other creatures and cultures in order to reach some sort of agreement so they can all work together to defend themselves against this invasion. The ant creatures aren’t evil,” Patrick warned.
And this is only the beginning.
The couple are already planning a second “Ernor” mini-series next summer.
“There is another series I would like to do but that is some time down the road,” Vicky said. “We will see how “Ernor” goes. I do have a one shot (individual story) idea I want to do. If we get far enough ahead on Ernor that I have some time to kind of slip it in, I will do that.”
The couple, who have been to two comic book conventions this year to promote their series, have also discussed doing an anthology where other authors and comic book artists will submit their own stories to be published.
“The anthology we had in mind was another anthropomorphic comic which would rely solely on contributions from other people. You would have in the same issue two to three stories; however, many would fit that are six or seven pages long,” Patrick said. “We’re not really set up at this point to start taking submissions but hopefully soon.”
The couple have already received encouraging letters from readers as far as Hawaii who commented how much they enjoyed the first issue.
Someone from Germany even sent Patrick an email to their website (http://www.ernor.com/).
The “Comic Buyer’s Guide” recently gave their seal of approval to Ernor with an A-.
The Keiths said they are confident the title will be successful.
“We’re hoping by the second storyline (second mini-series), we’ll be able to publish in color,” Vicky said. “But again, our readership may not want that. They may want us to stick with the black and white format. So far, the feedback has been really positive so we feel pretty good about it.”
Vicky said she doesn’t think there are any characters in comic books like the ones she and her husband are doing right now so to her, it seems like they are pretty original.
©11/3/99
